The moon moved into Scorpio’s region of the sky last night, and aligns with the Sun (who is already there waiting for her) today, which, from our point of view, results in a Scorpio new moon. This kicks off a thirty-day cycle to explore Donna Cunningham’s affirmations from Moon Signs for the Scorpio moon:
I release all resentments I have accumulated.
I let go of past hurts, betrayals and losses.
I accept my capacity to transform my life.
I open myself up to the right healing experiences.
Like the phoenix, I rise, transformed and whole.
Friday night I went to a Cappella Romana concert at St. James Cathedral. This extraordinarily good a cappella vocal ensemble, specializing in chant from the Eastern Orthodox tradition, presented a program of Byzantine liturgical chant from Hagia Sophia in Constantinople. This is old, old chant, some of the oldest in the Christian tradition, rescued by a few brave souls from the invading Turks in the 15th century but going back many centuries before that.
On an energetic level, listening to the group for an hour or so was incredibly powerful and an enormous blessing. The waves of perfectly in-tune, perfectly resonant chant in that wonderful acoustic space ran through my body and stirred it to response, opening up chakras and letting in divine light and other sensory wonders.
In parallel with this experience my mind was on another journey. In my past life as a Gregorian chant performer I have spent many hours in that cathedral, singing in concerts and liturgies, seeking to emulate with my own voice that angelic perfection that Cappella Romana so expertly achieves. It was always powerful, always moving…and I was always left ambivalent about it. Looking at it now through the lens of the shamanic spiritual path that has come to me, I can see what was missing from all those experiences. Creative self-expression. Autonomy. A personal and unique-to-me connection with Spirit. I spent those chant years in a double task: either seeking to bend that Gregorian chant practice into a shape that would really fit my soul, or seeking to bend my soul to fit its shape. In the end I couldn’t do either one; I had to let it all go and, in partnership with Spirit, rebuild myself from within.
Watching those singers on Friday night, grouped around a crucifix and chanting ancient hymns in honor of the True Cross, I was able to witness the joy of being united with brothers and sisters in a common spiritual path, where souls and hearts are truly aligned. And it confirmed with stunning clarity that this is not my path, that my path takes me into the woods where I can learn and be blessed and healed by the wise spirits there, and bring back wisdom and blessing and healing for others.
Those years of struggle did stir up a lot of feelings of frustration and disappointment, and experiences of those Scorpionic resentments, hurts, betrayals and losses that Donna Cunningham’s affirmations describe. I am learning every day to let go of all that and fill my life and heart with this new and profound awakening that is gradually but steadily overtaking me.
At the chant concert I had a new opportunity to test the soundness of my new vision, my new commitment to myself and was generally pleased with the result. The healing never stops, does it? But this month, in the hidden light of the Scorpio new moon, new glimpses are again visible of the transformed Phoenix, rising from the ashes of old dreams that just weren’t quite right for me.
